Ten Last Stands
by paintingAmystery
Summary: this is the way the world ends. a story centering on my thoughts about what could be won and what could be lost. up traitor, giant, gryffindor, dep.headmistress, dark lord, werewolf, mother, THE LOYAL SERVANT! please review for me. THANKS!
1. The Traitor

**PART ONE: UNTO THE ENDING OF THE WORLD**

**The Traitor**

It was painfully cold and the stars were dead.  

For some reason, this gave me an ugly satisfaction.  It helped me to believe I had been right, that the Darkness was unending.  Allowing these thoughts to drift with me offered no strength; my Lord had given me my strength.  I flexed the fingers of my right hand, the air collapsing so willingly before me.  It was a beautiful thing, and he was a great man.  No, he was a great Lord.  He was no man.

I was standing beside the mausoleum at the crown of the hill.  It was dotted with headstones, though not so heavily as the surrounding level ground.  At the very peak stood the Dark Lord, towering over the stones of death.  Behind one of them I knew the coward boy was hiding, preparing himself to scream another stream of accusations, then throw another collection of childish jinxes and then to duck and cower again when his protective stone was broken.  I could feel his panic, I could feel his fear.  What would he do when the last stone was broken?  A voice inside my head was busy reminding me that I knew this fear because it was my own, because I did not know what would happen when my last defenses were gone, when I could provide no more service but sport.  And so I resigned myself to continue service, unto the ending of the world.  It would be service in fear, hoping that the Dark Lord would be victorious over the Mudbloods and Traitors against their kind, hoping to come with him into dominance, his loyal servant.  My eyes jerked unwittingly toward Bellatrix, behind a tall obelisk leaning, crooked, on the slope of the hill.  Rodolphus signaled me from behind a nearer tombstone.  It was time.

I stroked the frigid wall of the mausoleum, my beautiful hand feeling nothing but its pathetic, crumbling stones.  It no longer knew the touch of cold.  As I caressed it gently, almost lovingly, this house of death, I crooned his name.  And then my nickname for him, mocking him, taunting him.  I heard him shift inside Death, creep away from the doorway, where the moon was sparkling.  The clouds were floating idly along, and I felt the moonlight on my back. 

"Moony, come out Moony.  How about another nighttime stroll, for old time's sake?  Come on Moony.  Can you hear him?  Is that James?  Your precious James?  Screaming for help, will you help him Moony?  Can you do anything now?  Come Moony, we will save him from the traitor together…"

I felt a fine dust spraying over my robes and realized I had crushed a chunk of the wall in my hand.  The Dark Lord was positively cackling now, the stupid boy was behind another stone.  From beside the mausoleum I surveyed the scene, and was kind enough to relate it to Remus, still cowering in the darkness of the mausoleum. 

"Do you hear them Moony?  The giant is out there, and the Weasley boy, who is not my master anymore.  He is cowering behind a stone, I can see him now.  Can't you see it, Moony?  Move a bit closer to the doorway, Moony, there they are.  What will you do Moony?  Can you save them?  Save Ron or  Longbottom?  Can you save the Mudblood, or Molly, or Minerva?  Can you save Harry, Moony, after all these years, can you save James's son?"

I scraped four deep crevasses into the wall. More screams echoed around me.  I carved them deeper and then stood back to examine my handiwork.  My beautiful hand.  One more caress and there would be a gash in the wall, right through solid and ancient stone.  I saw my own shadow where I intended to etch it, and gently slid my lone index finger in the deepest of the wounds.  It crumbled beneath my touch, raining dust on the expectant face of Remus Lupin.  I could see him wince.  I put my face up to the hole and grinned at him. 

"Why, _hello_ Remus.  Long time no see."

He cringed at the sound of my voice, his eyes barely open, scanning the edges of the fissure I had formed in the wall of his safe haven. 

"Oh, you are safe for now, Moony.  I think I fancy a little chat though, don't you think?"

I felt my words slide through the hole, smooth and oily, as I had never spoken before.  And I knew I belonged here, here in my absolute element, tormenting my tormentor.  I glared at him, putting behind my eyes, for him to see, all the hatred, for his laughter and his silence, for the days he tried to stop them and the days he did nothing, and most of all the days he bid them carry on, drag me to hell and back.  _Bastard_.  He was staring at me, a look of terror, a look I had never seen on him.  Except perhaps just before his more painful transformations.  _How ironic._

"I have nothing to say to you, Worm," he mumbled, sounding very afraid and very sick.  And of course, who could blame him?  Then I remembered that I blamed him, him and his cronies.  But he was the last of them.

"No," I muttered, drawing back and feigning thought, "No, you're right- I have nothing to say to you either..."

I saw my shadow shrink as I straightened up, barely covering the opening I had etched into the wall.  Remus shrunk toward the back of the house of Death, still dusty grey and shriveled, an old man long since dead inside.  I just had one more job for his body...

"Oh no, Remus, I have nothing to _say. _ I am not, however, through with you."

And I plunged my hand through the stone, closing it around his limp throat, still full with his gasp of surprise.  I drew his miserable face, stretched in a hideous grimace toward my own, and we eyed one another through the gaping hole.  I asked him if he was afraid and he choked in my hand, spittle dribbling pathetically from his creased and colorless face.  His eyes tried to sparkle, but failed.  Instead they shone vaguely, with a light that went out under my own gaze.  I closed my hand just a bit tighter, and his mouth opened.  I slid a gentle, frigid finger along his neck, and then leaned even closer.

"Can you save him now, Remus?"

I watched the tears form in his eyes, and took them as my answer.  One of them slid down to his chin and danced across the silver of my wrist, but I did not feel it.  It slid off quickly, not caught there as on Remus's face, trapped in wrinkled rivers and ashen canyons.  _No, he cannot save the boy._  He stopped writhing then, resigned himself to my grasp, but I did not loosen it when his resistance waned.  I pressed my thumb just a bit deeper into his soft and empty flesh, displayed my teeth in a cruel grin, and felt him cower yet again.  There were footsteps behind me, but the sounds were muffled, unnecessary distractions.  Moony was still crying.

"No, Moony, you cannot _save _him, but you can bite him, can't you?  It's time, Moony.  Let us go together…"

I stood up slowly, his neck craning to follow me.  A shaft of moonlight shot into the mausoleum, narrowly missing him.  He choked into my hand again.  

"Let us… Let us reawaken the wolf."

A sharp pain exploded in my head, and I heard Moony's body hit the far corner of the mausoleum.  I ripped my beautiful hand out of the house of Death and wrapped it around the thin wrist which had just come down on my temple.  Another blow struck my shins, this, clearly, from a foot, and we were tumbling down the hill behind the mausoleum, my hand crushing bone and sinew and squeezing the thin hand off the arm of a boy, about sixteen.  He rolled over top of me and was gone without his hand, and I felt my body stop moving.  My head was falling backward, and I felt an explosion of life as everything I had ever known crashed through my mind and burst around my eyes.  The rock drilled deep into my skull, the spray of my body exploding like a sunset from my mouth.  My head bounced up another few inches, ready for another impact, the earth taking its revenge.  I could see them all, shadows on the hill, black against tangible mass of light.  Were they human forms or just more markers of death?  There was an instant where the air pounded against my ears, trying to say something…

And time froze as the world ended.

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~*~ A/N- The world ending isn't death.  The person who attacks Peter loses his hand, as Peter did, and is thus the anti-Peter, to the anti-Voldemort…sorta… got it?  Up next- The Giant-Man.  It's all the same few minutes here in part one, then we'll see what happens in part two, which begins with chapter 6…~*~


	2. The Giant Man

**The Giant-Man**

It was painfully cold and the stars were dead.  

I didn't mind the chill so much, or the wind, as I had warmed up quite a bit in the process of getting there.  But the stars, the absolute blackness of the sky around a clear, bright moon was unnerving.  When we had been in the mountains, two summers before, the moon had been this bright.  But there had been stars as well, ten thousand stars. I shook myself, droplets of the tea I hadn't cleaned out of my beard catching the light before they died.  Like the stars.  

I wasn't supposed to come, I was supposed to stay with Harry, but Harry had come, and I had followed.  He was at the peak of the great hill before me, a hill taller even than I was.  There were flashes of light, red, blue, green, and white.  I couldn't hear what they were saying.  A sliver of silver flashed behind them, aimed at the mausoleum at the back of the crown of the hill.  I tried to see what lay within, but the moonlight cast a flaming reflection of whiteness, around which all was black.  As the moon rose the shadows lessened, silver fire spreading into the stone chamber.  Laughter echoed in my ears, high and frigid.  Tom was there, there with Harry.  I immediately threw a foot out at the base of the hill, intent on climbing, but a small voice reached my ears.

"You know you can do nothing," it whispered, soft and loving, but broken.  I flung my head around at the sound.  She was right, I could do nothing, I could do nothing to the Dark Lord unless he managed to conquer Harry.  All desire to do something, to help, evaporated from my soul at this thought.  I stepped around the headstone which had spoken to me.

"Molly?!"

She threw a finger up to her lips, but it was too late.  I had thought I knew misery when I realized I could do nothing.  Then I realized I could do this…  The Death Eaters were closing in, separated from the hooded dementors by grave masks and drawn wands.  They had heard me, seen me.  I glanced at Molly, her lightly lined face now wide with horror, her eyes dull and clouded with thoughts I would never know.  She looked so helpless all of a sudden.  She didn't belong here either; she had probably come to save Ron, Ron who had come with Harry.  And Hermione, where was she?  Molly's tears replaced the stars with their light, here on earth where things as beautiful as stars are quick to die.  Her fingers where white against the cold rock of the headstone she was clutching, her red hair swept up in a wind I didn't have time to feel.  The light swishing of cloaks pulled my gaze toward a dozen figures, slipping from behind tombstones and down the hill like shadows. 

Instinct lifted my foot and set it back down again.  Now I was standing in front of Molly, Molly who they hadn't seen, Molly who they may have missed.  I shook the thought from my head.  Only one of them was mask-less, only one dementor.  I didn't have a wand though, or my umbrella.  I had nothing.  A Stunning Spell stung my leg like an idle bee.  I had something, I had giant blood.  My size may have damned Molly, but it may yet save her.  

First I struck the nearest of them, a Death Eater who had hesitated.  And then the next.  I tried to remain between them and Molly, simultaneously pulverizing every inch of them available to me.  A crackling breath distracted me long enough for another fool to attempt a Stunning Spell.  I heard the rush of water in my ears, I heard the memories I had shut out for so long. _Rubeus, your father…_

My fire was back in an instant when I heard his voice.  He wasn't here; I didn't know where he would be, but Dumbledore's voice gave me strength.  Maybe even a touch too much of it.  Another Death Eater fell, this one crashing against a headstone.  His mask was around his neck, a pure whiteness against black, a tragic look.  A splay of silvery gold hair hugged his pale chin.  His frigid silver eyes were wide as his last breath was forced out, not unlike the rattling sound of the dementor.  I silently cursed Lucius as I took out my wrath on the remaining figures, now cut down to four.  Molly was sobbing.  Another one fell.  I felt small hands clutching at my hip in horror, following me, shielded behind me.  Another Death Eater fell in a bloody heap.  I heard a whisper, but I didn't know what she was saying.  The last two fell as one, a massive fist crushing one's skull and sending him flying into his neighbor.  Molly's hands accidentally passed frightfully over an area of mangled flesh.  Some curse had hit its mark.  

I turned to look at her.  She was white now, her hair looked like blood against her pale face.  When had she gotten this thin? But there was no time to wonder.  I tried to keep her behind me, tried to save her with the mass that had damned her.  They had found her, because of me.  She might have been spared.

"No!" I growled it aloud.

_No, I saved her.  I saved her.  _I had killed for Molly now, killed perhaps a dozen thin forms.  The dementor was gone.  I felt salty tears against my arm.  She was hanging off me now.  I closed my hand around her upper arm.  Her wand lay forgotten under the arm of a fallen servant of the Dark Lord. Tom was laughing.  A thousand sounds suddenly pressed in on me as I realized I could hear.  Tom was laughing, someone was whispering.  Molly was sobbing and Harry was screaming.  Neville was here too.  He didn't belong here.   I heard a woman's shrill and grating laugh, and another roar.  Another flash of silver struck the mausoleum, and I distinctly heard the crunch of ancient stone.  Someone choked.

I no longer felt the pressure of Molly's arm.  I looked around at her and she was standing, immobile, her arms at her sides.  A flash of red streaked right in front of us, unseeing.  

"YOU RAT!"

The figure leapt right over the last of the fallen Death Eaters and halted halfway up the hill, poised on its slope. He stared at the mausoleum, his eyes boring into the open, moonlight door.  He turned his thin face toward us but stopped before his eyes could meet his mother's.  The last Death Eater lifted his head to look at him. Macnair.  He caught my eye and I moved to draw Molly behind me again.  His mouth was moving; I didn't need to read those twisted lips.  I felt hell closing around me.  She scratched my arm sharply.

"RON!"

I felt my arm fly out at Molly as the light exploded from his wand.  I was daring it to hit me, to test giant-blood against the curse of death.  Someone was screaming.  My arm was searing.  I hadn't expected pain.  I fell over to my left, my leg twisting awkwardly as my knees hit the sickly, rotten ground.  It was either Molly or me that gasped as the green light cast eerie shadows I didn't have the time to see…

And time froze as the world ended.

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~*~ A/N- The world ending still isn't death.  Yes, Ron attacked Peter and lost his hand.  Yes, Molly jumped out to stop him.  No, I am not going to tell you who actually does die here.  You will have to see for yourself.  Up next is The Gryffindor.  Enjoy! ~*~


	3. The Gryffindor

**The Gryffindor**

It was painfully cold and the stars were dead.

I was shivering, and I missed the stars.  I knew they were still there, somewhere, I knew darkness hadn't stolen them completely, but I had no way of knowing when they'd be back, or if they would ever be as bright.  I pulled my robes around me, cold fingers hovering over the Gryffindor emblem emblazoned there.  I didn't feel any warmer, and I didn't feel like a Gryffindor.  In fact, my knees felt an awful lot weaker than was safe on the slimy slopes of that steep hill.  

I knew I didn't belong here.  Hermione had told me to stay put, that we had to stay put.  But we had all fled after he killed her.  The Dark Lord killed her, was going to kill us all, one by one.  We had fled, Harry, Ron, and I, to this spot, chasing him.  Where had Hagrid and Mad-Eye gone?  They had left us, left us and Hermione was dead.  I felt vaguely ill, which was swiftly remedied when my stomach emptied itself onto the ground in front of me.  It blended well with the filth of the hill.  I felt guilty about falling behind, guilty about being afraid.  I didn't want to look up, to see Harry ducking and hiding, to hear him scream about his parents and about Sirius, about Hermione, Tonks, Mr. Weasley, Ginny, Luna… About Mad-Eye.  Had he died?  All those things to scream about, I felt them all tearing at my insides again.  How did it come to this?  And did the Dark Lord make the same mistake again- how much did the dead love the boy who lived?

I shook my head and tried to creep around the hill.  It was slippery and I fell.  Someone near the top heard me and came rushing down, someone in a dark cloak and a white mask.  I looked up at him, willing him to come to me, to kill me for being stupid enough to come, slow enough to be alone, clumsy enough to fall, but whoever it was whipped past me, throwing a swift look not quite at me.  What appeared to be a male form hurried along the ridge at the back of the hill, coming down where a woman had just appeared, with a bird.  I made to scream her name, but Professor McGonagall held a finger to her mouth to silence me.  The cloaked man in the mask looked back over his shoulder and shook his head.  I couldn't see the bird anymore. 

It took me a while to realize I was still on the ground, sliding ever so slowly toward the base of the hill.  I focused on my feet as I tried to right myself, all the while cursing my own worthless mind to immense suffering and guilt for coming here to be a liability.  I thought of my father, of my mother.  I thought of Gran and knew she would have told me to stay home, to be a good boy and not go messing things up.  She may have been hard on me, but from this side of the hill it looked like she was saving more lives than she was hurting.  And I didn't belong here.

As I fumbled through my robes for my wand, my mother's now, as I had already lost my father's, I felt a sharp pain in my left hand.  I was still sideways on the ground, without the energy or spirit to lift my upper body and progress around the hill to whatever death suited me best.  Someone had trod on my fingers, and hadn't yet moved a rather light but pointed shoe.  I looked up and saw a woman's boot pressing my bloodied fingers deeper into the muck.  I jerked them away, which, though painful, was a matter of pride.  I heard her voice.

"Well, well, well, here is something that does not belong."

I felt her grinning, felt my own face go red as I struggled to my feet.  I had nothing to say, no retort- I truly did not belong here.  Her white mask shone too brightly against the starless night, competing only with the full moon.  Her cloak quickly swept over her boots, her wand was drawn.  I knew it was pointed at me, knew it was pointless to stand up.  What had I been thinking, coming here?  Well, at least this woman wouldn't be a part of someone else's hell.

"Your mother cracked first, Longbottom.  She couldn't seem to stand watching her worthless husband writhing like an animal..."

I knew it was a waste to stand, knew I would only fall, but I got up to look her in the empty eyes behind that mask.  Her voice was so vicious, so heartless.  Very much unlike any other woman.  A lock of her hair had escaped the hood, but it hardly mattered.  It was just as black.

"She blubbered an awful lot about you…"

I could tell I was crying, fuming.  I could tell I was losing control.  It was that Lestrange woman, that- that evil- there were no words and I knew it.  I remained silent as ever.  I had nothing to say.  She was shaking her ugly, masked face at me, taunting me like some stupid animal.  Her voice was demented by the mask over her mouth, her eyes were shadowed, deep pits in the soft mask.  Black holes.  Windows to a soul that I knew wasn't there.  Hand her to the dementors?  No soul…

"What?" she asked me, almost as though she wanted an answer.  I kept my lips shut tight.  My face was soaking now.  "Aren't you going to return the favor- blubber about her before you die?"

She stared at me, her eyes still empty.  I tried to see myself in them, but there was nothing.

"No," I choked out, the single syllable all twisted and breathless.

"What was that, boy?"

"No."  I said it with more resolve this time, still quiet but stiff.  She stroked her wand, possibly grinning.  I wouldn't know.

"No!"  My wand was out.  She took an inadvertent step back before regaining that Death Eater composure.  She stuck her face out at me, offering me the first shot.  She laughed her ugly laugh.  I brought the wand over my head, immediately thinking of Harry- what he would have done, what he had taught me… 

"NO!"  

The wand came swishing down, my mother's wand.   Bellatrix Lestrange screamed.  I held the wand on her, unaware what curse I was working.  She tried to look at me; her eyes were rolling madly.  Her legs were bent and her hands were clenched at her sides, unmoving.  She did nothing but her eyes were moving wildly, protruding and shining white, finally visible behind her mask.  I tried to stop, but the wand held its ground.  As I pulled my arm back my fingers slid to the very end of my mother's wand, and, unwilling to drop it, I held on.  Blood was dripping down her mask now, like tears.  The white was stained by rose red trails ending in dirty red droplets.  

And then she was on her back.  I moved toward her; the wand pulled itself right to her throat.  And when I took the next step, toward her clenched hand, I saw her eyes, the black holes, giving off all the life that their emptiness had stolen, all the hell her soul-less self had wrought now dripping from her deep-set eyes.  Her hands were freed from their bind, and they slashed madly.  One caught me in the calf.

It was just then that I knew I was falling, loosing my mother's wand.  It held firm at the throat on which it sought revenge.  I toppled backward.  My feet left the slippery slope of the hill.  I was over the ridge behind it, there was nothing bellow me for a few yards.  I watched the moon shrink away, watched Harry dodge another curse, watched Bellatrix flail blindly, trying to grasp her own fallen wand, or the one cursing her.  I watched it all in half an instant, expecting the sickening squelch of impact, expecting some Death Eater to find me.

A woman screamed, "RON!"

I turned to see who it was, where it had come from, and saw nothing but the headstone bellow me.  Bellatrix finally managed a blood curdling scream.  The stone did not need to brace for impact, and I could not.  I tried to kick out, to right myself, but before I could, my legs were gone.  I felt my upper body slinging itself over the back of the headstone.  My legs were gone.  There were no stars to watch me.  And I thought of my mother and my father, who's bodies were untouched.  I had my mind.  For whatever that was worth…

And time froze as the world ended.

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~*~ A/N- Told you it was dark.  I am considering a rating change- much appreciation to anyone so kind as to give me advice on this issue and any others in a review.  Okay, the stars are symbolic, to Neville at least, of his parents.  He hits the tombstone and breaks his back- he's paralyzed.  And the first Death Eater to run by? We shall see, we shall see.  Up next is The Deputy Headmistress.  Thanks for reading! ~*~


	4. The Deputy Headmistress

**The Deputy Headmistress **

It was painfully cold and the stars were dead.

It was unnerving, how much the full moon stood out, pale and cold, and very much alone.  My thoughts immediately flew to Remus; I hadn't seen him for two days now, and I doubted Severus had managed to prepare the potion anyhow.  He had been busy, working for his second master.  Or rather, first.  I didn't know.  The phoenix on my shoulder clenched his claws, no doubt aware that I was frustrated.  I looked up at him, almost smiling, before we surveyed the scene together.  At the top of the hill, flashes of light lit the headstones and shadows so brightly they could hardly be seen.  I thought I heard Potter, but the sound was muffled.  Around the hill and to my left, Hagrid was fighting off an onslaught of enemies.  The Longbottom boy was already face-down in the mud opposite Hagrid and to my left.  I stared at him for a long while, trying to discern his condition.  His head jerked upward, to where a cloaked figure was hurrying along the ridge.  He then turned to me, but I put a finger to my mouth.  The boy was alive, for now.  

The cloaked figure pretended not to notice Neville Longbottom face-down on the side of the hill, and hurried toward me.  The bird, seeing him coming I presumed, was immediately gone from my arm, becoming a part of the starless night.  The man made the journey unsteadily, wavering slightly but moving purposefully enough to keep his balance.  His mask came into sharp focus as he looked up and met my eyes, now only four or so meters away.  

"Don't scream," he whispered, very commandingly.  I nodded to show I understood, as he threw a sharp look back at Longbottom, who remained silent.   I would have thanked the stars, had they the courtesy to show up, but they did not.  The moon glared at me.  

The Death Eater took the remaining few steps until he was right before me.  I had recognized him by voice, but now I could see the black eyes I knew so well shining eerily behind the slits of his mask.  He held out his wand.  I took a deep breath, my body responding more than ever to the cold.  My toes were numb, my fingers white and the circulation obviously halted.  My chest was tight.  I looked up at Severus, his wand tip now aimed directly at my breast.  For half an instant I thought he was going to do it.  He hesitated a moment longer.  I tried to take advantage of his obvious conflict of interest, at which point I remembered that I trusted him.  He spoke again.

"No, Minerva.  You know I have to win- it will hurt you to offer competition."

I pulled my hand out of my robes, leaving the wand behind.  He improved his stance for the upcoming one-sided duel, re-aiming his wand carefully.  He gave me a pointed stare and shook his head so slightly I may have been seeing things.  I didn't dare move my eyes too far from the wand, which he, at that moment, twirled almost idly, before reassuming his original stance.  He was an excellent dueler, impeccable stance, well handled wand, wide knowledge of curses and counter-curses, which he wouldn't need.  My wand poked into my chest as I leaned forward slightly.  He whispered almost directly into my ear.

"Be strong for me."

He was going to do it- I could see it in his eyes, see the hatred and the horror, see the power he would need to work the curse.  I could see it all there behind Severus's cold black eyes, like the night sky, where all the stars had vanished.  His lips parted ever so slightly, his tongue passing out to moisten them against the cold.  And then I knew he was ready.  I was on my knees before he even said the word.  He spoke it loudly enough to be heard.

"_Crucio"_

I drew a sharp breath, refusing to scream.  And then I looked up.  Severus was twisting, writhing, but he kept his eyes locked to mine, his lips tight.  I could see the tears in his eyes, and felt them also in my own.  His wand arm was shaking violently, his eyes were bulging, his legs were trembling.  I knew I could not let him fall and I could not hold him up.  I drew my wand.  _Be strong for me…_

"_Mobilicorpus."_

And I held him upright, struggling with such a simple spell, struggling because he knew he had to perform the curse, on one of us.  His eyes were pleading with me.  I murmured his name and saw the curse lifted.  I gave him a moment to gasp and then relinquished control of his body.  Severus placed his hands on his knees, his eyes level with my still kneeling form.  He spoke no word, and I doubted he could have opened his mouth without screaming.  He had left the curse there far too long, in my opinion.  The wand he was holding backward was now hanging limply from his hand.  He was staring into my eyes, willing me to see his heart, his soul, his loyalty.  I gave him a weak smile he could not return, and then I remembered to breathe.

To work the curse he needed to want it, to take pleasure in it.  All the hatred which had driven the full ten minute attack had been toward himself, a past I could not know, deeds I could not fathom.  I felt the respect I had never offered Severus dangling on my lips, begging to just drip off, to cover him and make him safe, but I knew I could not speak to him.  He straightened up and plunged his free hand into his robes, his wand hand clenching again.  He withdrew an unconscious rat and a vial, tossing each on the ground before me.  He knelt again.

"Drink up," he whispered ever so softly.  I opened my mouth to ask him what it was, but closed my lips at the sight of him twirling his wand at me again.  I picked up the vial, removed the stopper, and put it to my lips.  The rat was starting to wake, to twitch.  Severus put a hand on my shoulder as the vial trembled near my mouth.  I felt his strength flooding my arm, and swallowed.  My peripheral vision blurred immediately.

"You will be alright.  Be silent."

He whispered these words to me before his face began to swim and sound grew muffled.  Be silent.  I knew that this was the moment when his loyalty would be tested, and chided myself for doubting him.  I could hardly see his blurred form, but could tell it had straightened up again.  He brandished his wand, vanished the vial.  A woman screamed, and I wondered vaguely if it was me.  Another woman screamed.  Was this one me?  I couldn't see anymore.  Harry screamed, and I wondered where Albus had gone.  I felt the slight movement of air as Severus sucked in the breath he would exhale in the shape of the Killing Curse.  And he said it, but I didn't feel the light.  It was muffled.  No, that wasn't Severus.  That was Potter.  Potter.  He had done it.  Albus said he had a plan.  Albus… And then my thoughts were with Severus again.  Severus who would kill Potter for this.  _Would he be able to…? No… plan… Albus… Severus…_He began the words…

And time froze as the world ended.

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~*~ A/N- _Still _not death.  Yep, that's Severus.  Still hasn't been found out, still trying not to kill people he likes.  We all love him, don't we?  The screaming women- Molly and Bella.  That rat? -  We shall see yet again.  Up next is The Dark Lord.  This one should actually be revealing… Albus… plan… Albus…~*~


	5. The Dark Lord

**The Dark Lord**

It was painfully cold and the stars were dead.

I had always preferred the cold, however, and the absence of the stars was well made up for by the presence of a glorious full moon.  Peter would be dealing with _that _any minute now.  Rodolphus was behind the headstone at my back, and Bella was off to my right.  Malfoy and the rest of the lot down at his level were swarming the base of the hill.  He didn't know it, but I could sense Severus lingering behind a headstone near Bella.  His worthless mind revealed that he was waiting for McGonagall.  Yes, the Potter boy would have told her we were here.  Or perhaps the giant oaf.  It certainly wasn't the crazy old Auror or the know-it-all Mudblood, I had seen to that.  

Next on the list of things to 'see to' would be Potter, the fool dancing around in front of me.  He was employing his usual tactic, ducking behind headstones.  The boy had always shown a tendency to rely on the dead.  I saw him stand a bit too high and aimed a painful curse at the back of his head.  He ducked.  He and his father had been excellent Quidditch players.  Those instincts, however, would not save him from what I had in store.  I laughed a little more, not really to goad him but because something was actually entertaining me.  The stupid boy was dodging curses behind headstones while I reminisced about the good old days.  Potter always seemed the think he had something I did not.  Well, whatever that was, it wasn't important.  Anyhow, it would probably prove his undoing.  I, on the other hand, had time.  Time to laugh.  It seemed to be irritating him… _Oh, well! _  Potter took a break from ducking curse-Bludgers and swung around to explain to me, in simple terms, that I had killed his parents.  I told him, yes, I knew that, and then got back to business.  He seemed to think he could make me feel guilt.  Fool.  People like him were so annoyingly predictable.  Another headstone cracked down the middle.  

I gave Potter the opportunity the scuttle over to the next marker and took the time to signal Rodolphus.  The purple sparks had barely faded when I heard the werewolf groan as Peter taunted him.  At least the rat and his stupid past could be of use to me once more.  We had brought the wolf here and tortured him thoroughly, then set him aside for later.  As I ticked off these memories and shot curses at random headstones, I was vaguely reminded of Potion Brewing.  _Let simmer for twenty minutes over high flame.  Set aside.  Add aconite after two hours…_ I laughed again.  

I was drawn back to my idle reality when Potter stopped squirming and darting about.  I had been busy toying with the idea of removing his legs when he had halted in mid-dash and looked up with his bloody face.  There was a mysterious ball of fire flashing in and out of existence above us.  After I allowed us each time to marvel at this particular fact, I resumed shooting curses at Potter.  He, of course, was forced to give up staring lovingly at the fireball and had to continue along his flight to the next headstone.  They were definitely thinning… 

Then the fire-ball was gone.  There was no real sound to warn us of this, but it bowed out to the moon just as I heard Peter smash through the wall of the mausoleum.  _Good, _I thought.  The word seemed to echo in my mind, bouncing around, reflecting on all my other thoughts.  I lifted my hand in a sign calling for a halt.  It was extremely painful, burning, screaming.  I turned to look at it, but it was just as it always was, black sleeve and thin fingers, held up and asking Potter to stop running.  Where was my wand?  It was lying innocently a little ways away from my feet.  I bent to pick it up.  After a moment I realized that I was still standing perfectly upright, winning some very peculiar glances from the Potter boy, who still hadn't ducked for cover.  I tried again to fetch my wand, but as I stared it seemed only to move farther away.  I was straight upright, in spite of my efforts to retrieve the offending wand.  

That was when I felt him.  _Him._  The frustration was exploding in me, racing through my veins and seeping from my skin.  I opened my mouth to scream.

"Stay here Harry," he commanded in my voice, which sounded quite awkward when used so gently.

My mind was screaming at him, but even as I rained filthy little blows down on him, I felt myself sinking backward, losing ground.  He pressed around within me and I blinked.

_This is my art.  This is my body.  This is my hour…_

He didn't answer me.  I choked.

The pain was immeasurable.  I was failing.  

I was winning.

I didn't answer him, and he choked.  His mind slid away, scratching my own, fighting me.  But I proved victorious.  Every so often his desires would surface, but I batted them away like stray flies.  I held up his hand, ignoring the lighting bursting in our arm.

"Harry," he said, I said for him, "Stay here, Harry.  I am calling the dementors.  Let them come, Harry, please."

Harry looked at the Dark Lord very strangely then, obviously startled by the use of his first name, and by the sincerity of the voice I sent through his lips.  _I will make you immortal, Harry.  _I felt the Dark Lord's confusion, which could only mean he did not know.  No, the Dark Lord had never known the prophecy.  I did not bother to hide it from his mind now- he would not have time to use what he discovered.  _And either must die at the hand of the other…_ His rage ran wild in our body, heightening our pain as it coursed through his overcrowded veins, where I was lurking.  

_He alone can kill you, Harry.  He alone, so long as his body endures.  And his body will endure.  I will make you immortal, Harry._

The dementors were coming now, coming to my signal.  Harry gaped at the Dark Lord, allowing the forms of the dementors to invade only the corners of his mind.  He shut them out, but did not move for his wand.  The Dark Lord summoned it with my power, and we held it.  I could feel my beautiful bird's feather within it, and it was still warm from Harry's touch.  He slid to his knees, and began to crawl.  The dementors were only a few meters away now, the Dark Lord's thoughts clanging in our head.  The horrors I alone among the living knew in him were echoing randomly and dimly in his mind, and I stood watching.  They were memories he had tried to shed with his innocence in Transylvania, after leaving school.  They had returned with him.  I suppressed my pity, knowing full well that the pain would be unbearable, would drive him from his own body.  The Dark Lord did not know pity, and I needed his soul to remain.  I would leave before it happened, before it was too late.  And if not?  _I will make you immortal, Harry._

They were here now.  I turned to face them.  Five dementors forming a half-ring about me.  The Dark-Lord's thoughts were becoming very boisterous.  I was letting him return, as I would have to leave him before the Kiss, at the moment when it was too late.  Severus would protect Minerva- I had told him to bring her back to our school with him.  He was waiting for the end.  I would bring Harry back with me, make him understand.  _I will make you immortal, Harry.  _The Dark Lord was screaming, I let the sound leave the mouth which I had been borrowing, but no one heard it.  The dementors swallowed it.  I felt Harry drawing nearer, and as the nearest dementor stretched a hand toward the Dark Lord's neck, I turned his body to face the boy.  We both saw that Harry had stood up now, a wand between his fingers, far too long to be his own.  The Dark Lord recognized it, and I recognized his emotions.  I knew Harry had practiced the curse, thinking he would need it.  I fought my way back into the Dark Lord, deeper, deeper, needing to tell Harry no, no, to wait. _ Wait Harry.  It's me.  I will make you immortal Harry.  Let his body be…_I saw it in his eyes, saw it in his face.  The anger was etched into his mouth, the hatred, the horror.  He was ready.  I tried to tell myself that he wouldn't do it, couldn't do it, that the curse would fail.  

_And either must die at the hand of the other…_

_"Avada Kedavra"_

And time froze as the world ended.

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~*~ A/N- This was a fun one to write… but anyhow, that was Dumbledore's plan.  It was pretty obscure, so let me sum up- He came as the phoenix, he possessed the Dark Lord, he called the dementors… the plan?  1. Possess the Dark Lord.  2. Incapacitate the Dark Lord. 3. Do NOT kill the Dark Lord. tadAAAAH!  _I will make you immortal, Harry…  _Harry, being his usual self-absorbed self decided to take the necessary action…  BOOM! And part two, AN INSTANT AND WHAT COMES AFTER starts with The Werewolf next chapter… Much Love! ~*~


	6. The Werewolf

**PART TWO: AN INSTANT AND WHAT COMES AFTER**

**The Werewolf**

Nothing moved and I wasn't breathing.

My whole body was trapped as it was.  My legs were bent and I was hunched on my knees, as though praying.  My right arm was up, hand brushing my throat.  The pain was perpetual now, unchanging.  I knew it would be a dull throb when time resumed, but for now, all was still.  My left arm was extended, reaching toward the hole in the wall.  My eyes alone seemed able to function, and they took in the many details of my surroundings.  My robes were dusty and torn, my hair was hanging annoyingly against my face, and my back was still sore where I had thrown myself against the wall in horror.  I was huddled in the deep corner of the mausoleum, mouth still open in a silent, strangled scream.  My extended arm was held fast only a hairs breadth away from a bright shaft of moonlight, stabbing like a blade through the wall of my hideaway.  The pull of the moon was dead with time, and my hand held fast out of the light.  I knew that when all things resumed I would be drawn by an idle curiosity to pass my hand through the seemingly solid brightness, to feel it on me.  I felt the wolf stir again, which was ill company.  I could only hope that Albus would get them out…

They had dragged me here for that purpose, to be a tool for the undoing of friends and enemies, blind to which were which.  For this third shining moment of his pitiful life, Peter Pettigrew had a secret worth handing over, a past worth falling back on.  Snape had never told the Dark Lord what I was, out of no love I knew for myself, or for good things.  Perhaps he had taken Dumbledore's orders to heart back when Dumbledore alone had stood by him.  Somehow I doubted that it had slipped his mind.  Indeed, as I continued to scan through to possibilities, it seemed likely that the Dark Lord had known all along, and that Peter's true use would prove fetching me and storing me for the opportune moment, which any dunderhead could likely have managed.  I hadn't exactly made myself scarce the past few weeks.  

I had felt useless, trapped.  James had been trapped by Voldemort, and Sirius… Sirius had been trapped by the Ministry.  Harry had been trapped, we had trapped him.  _I felt like a time-bomb, professor… _But Harry… I was so much like Sirius.  Harry was not one of us.  I felt guilt again.  Shame.  Sympathy.  Loss.  _God, I knew this feeling so well.  _I was always trapped between the foaming jaws of the wolf, writhing and only digging their razor blades deeper and deeper into bloodied flesh.  I always resisted, I always insisted, but I could do nothing.  I was trapped in a body which was trapped in the jaws of the wolf, and I was useless there.  I wanted to go out and to warn people, protect people, fight the darkness which held me down.  But others were far better placed than I, Alastor at the Ministry, Minerva and the rest at the school, and Albus, at the very top of everything.  And people were much more trusting toward the leader of the movement against Voldemort than toward a werewolf who had to beg for window cleaning jobs. 

All of England was a vast web of Fidelius Charms, the Secret Keepers had their Secret Keepers, who had their own and so on until everyone was somehow strung up all together.  The spiders roamed the web freely, Death Eaters and Dementors, traitors and thieves who paid allegiance to themselves and to their purses.  The foulest and most gluttonous of them all sat quite at the center, devouring all who went past, but rarely straying from his post himself.  Sometimes the insects caught in the web forgot to be afraid of him, and devoted their fear to the more mobile enemies.  Every so often a fly would pass by and catch himself on the threads.  He would die.  Indeed, the spiders thickened and expanded their webs to catch flies.  All spiders love the taste of flies.  There were butterflies too, some caught, some flitting about pointlessly, some trying to untangle those pinned in the web, next to be eaten.  There was even a butterfly pretending to be a spider.  _How strange.  _

Outside the pitiful window of my equally pitiful cage, a butterfly was suspended in midair, halted with the rest of all moving things.  I watched it for a while, a while which never really existed, before it faded out of focus.  My eyes slid farther, across the hill.  But there were only shadows there, shadows I was not ready to see.  I tried to look back to where Ronald had come from, tried to see Molly, who had screamed, but my body was fixed staring out of the hole in my shelter.  Had I thought it a cage?  I was hiding here, hiding from myself.  It was something between being sheltered and trapped.  And I had never liked either.  I pushed myself to think about Ron, Ron who had stared at me, white-faced, from across the hill.  He had seen Peter first.  But when he had seen me, he had come running.  He had understood.  Had they always known what a liability I would prove to be?  Or was I being arrogant?  He probably hadn't seen me at all, as the moonlight was blinding.  It was usually hatred which drove such acts as his, violent acts.  Love was more pure than that.  Love drove me to cry.

The air which separated me from the butterfly was thick and vaguely warped, where my scream had halted.  It would be an ugly sound to hear, but, had it made it out in time, it may have just ever so briefly extended the moment when my hopes shifted from success to survival for Albus Dumbledore.  I stared at the thin, arched form of the Dark Lord, whose head was lost under the hood of a dementor.  I stared and stared and took the empty time I had to plead with Fate to let us succeed, to let all go as planned.  Harry wasn't supposed to come.  God, why was he here?  Harry…  I couldn't see him from here, but I had heard him say the words, plain as day.  They were supposed to watch him, to stop him from running off and fulfilling what he would call destiny.  Alastor and Hagrid.  Hagrid was here, I had seen him with Molly.  Ron was here, and Neville too.  Peter had mentioned him, and Hermione, though I hadn't seen either.  Minerva would be here by now, she was to leave with Severus.  And we knew Albus had come.  Who brings a pocketful of galleons to go shopping at Knockturn Alley?  And Harry.  _Why did you come Harry, what did he dangle before you this time?_  Baiting him.  Just as he had baited a hungry wolf.  _Can you save him, Moony…_

The butterfly twitched, warning me.  I braced for the impact of time, my right arm ready to stop the left on its inexorable journey into the moonlight.  I moved, throwing my whole body deeper into the corner.  It was like the ocean refusing the tide, but I am a stubborn old ocean and I wanted to give them time to flee, while it was still hesitant outside, still silent.  The butterfly appeared to be dangling from a different wing now.  Why hadn't I seen the flame of Dumbledore leaving?  The body of the dark lord fell back, haltingly, as the world skipped beats on its way back into function.  The dementor rose.  The thin, fallen body, which housed somewhere between zero and two souls, was my last human observation.  It hit the ground with a resounding thud, first of all the many sounds to hurtle themselves against my transforming ears.  My heart was broken in the dust someplace.  I would probably eat it before I was in my right mind again.  

And a thousand screams were loosed with the stars

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~*~ A/N- That's the style of Part Two, an Instant and What Comes After.  Depending on who's POV we're working with the instant or what comes after may be longer etc.  But that won't be apparent until another chapter pops up.  I bet you get the butterflies thing.  The flies are Muggles.  The party continues next chapter with The Mother.  Guess which? Hehe… much thanks and love and stuff. ~*~


	7. The Mother

**The Mother **

Nothing moved and I wasn't breathing.

I was pinned in an awkward position, and ought to have been falling.  My legs were twisted and tilted away from Hagrid, whose massive form mirrored my own arced fall.  My right arm was out in front of me, caught there on its path to stop my fall.  My left arm was extended toward Hagrid, clawing a piece of his own right arm as he fell away from me, exposing me.  His head was turned toward me, taking my in as I took in all my surroundings.  My own gaze was fixed directly upon a green haze just before me, aiming a bit left of my heart.  I stared at it, stared through it; I focused all of my concentration on moving during this instant, however long it would be, which was given to me.  I soon discovered that the moment did not exist, that I was truly trapped along with Hagrid, and all other things.  I could only hope that something would go wrong… or right… I could only hope.

I could not see my son from here.  He had vanished over the hill, behind the dark mausoleum where some unknown figure had been hovering.  I wasn't supposed to have come at all, and the thick haze refusing to stop obstructing my sight was rather like a punishment for having come anyhow.  How many times had I told my children that no matter what happened, they must stay at Headquarters?  Of course, they had not obeyed.  And I had followed.  The house had been in complete disarray, to the point where I could not even credit the disorganization to my brief absence.  The boys and Hermione were gone, though I only counted three sets of footsteps running along the muddy path.  We had long since moved Headquarters from Grimmauld Place, which had become all the more sickeningly grim.  And we had discovered the treachery of the elf.  Alastor and Hagrid had not been in when I stopped by, which I knew ought not to have been the case.  There was still no sign of Alastor, though it appeared Hagrid had followed the boys here as well.  I, however, had been able to Apparate a few times along the way, always on the same path, due north.  I had come to this place long before Hagrid had arrived.

I pushed the memory of Hagrid's arrival out of my mind, not wanting to hear the tiny voice tell me that it had been his gargantuan presence which had alerted the Death Eaters to my own.  It was not because of Hagrid anyhow- I still would have screamed and been noticed.  Indeed, I would have died much sooner had I not been such a coward, afraid even to go after Neville when he dashed behind the hill, afraid to go help Harry where no help could be truly offered.  I hadn't seen Ron at all though, and when his lanky body crossed my line of sight I lost control of the tongue I had held still for most of the ordeal.  Ron- why did he have to come?  I asked him to stay home, even if the others left him, told each of them in turn to remain behind.  Even sweet Hermione had been difficult about this.  Children, thinking they can save the world.  And perhaps they can, but they tend to do more damage in the process than the adults we have in charge.  

I wanted to save my children. I had always wanted to protect them from Darkness.  I had had Arthur to help me at one point, but he was busy saving Muggles now.  We had had a number of rows about it, and had never reached an agreement.  I tried not to think about this either, or about Ginny.  Ginny, who was so beautiful and so young, so loving.  Ginny who was so happy.  I would have been sobbing were sobbing allowed here in this hole in the world.  I thought of Fred and George, and imagined them switching places on me, as usual.  I thought of Bill who had come back to help defend us here in England, and of Charlie who had stayed in Romania.  I was not happy nor was I upset with either decision.  I still hadn't thought about Percy, though I did not forget that he was there to be thought about.   I thought about Harry and Hermione, my second set of children, laughing as they rarely did these days.  Ron's face floated into my head, Ron, my youngest son, my youngest living child.  Someplace over that dark and deadly hill.  

It loomed up like a sleeping beast, suddenly, alone among all things, awake in this frozen moment.  The green haze perpetually interrupting my gaze made it look fresh and alive but I knew better.  It was dark and dirty, slick and wet, and sprinkled like a great pudding, only with headstones and not sugar lumps.  I knew that it was really a sick place, where hidden people cowered in mausoleums, afraid to face the horrors before them.  It was a place where brave young men tempted fate and lost to it, where evil people gathered to enact their secret plots.  And I did not know what was to happen now, now that time was gone and thought alone was left to a dozen survivors of the battle here.  

Thinking was causing my head to throb, a slow, dull throb.  I felt it over and over again, suddenly aware that Hagrid's warm arm was slipping slower than it normally would have, but it was moving nonetheless.  I actually saw the heavy haze of green creeping up on me, rolling through the air like a wind-swept cloud.  A storm was coming; I could feel it all of a sudden.  The old break in my right leg was suddenly and sharply quite sore, with a severe pressure drop.  A storm was coming.  I moved my eyes to see more than I could have done before.  I tried to see who was hidden in the mausoleum, as it gave off a funny sound of shifting weight.  I still couldn't move my body.  

My breast suddenly tightened with breath, but it was caught there again.  A slight change came over the shadows at the hill's peak and I observed them for the first time.  The Dark Lord's back was arched too sharply for a human form, falling backward out of the arms of the dementor before him.  A young man was brandishing a long, thin wand, his arm trapped out in front of him, a dueling stance, chest-high.  Another jolt stole my breath.  I struggled for more air, finding myself very much in need of it, but could not get anything the pass my lips.  The screams and other sounds hovered like my death haze all around, twisting the masked and unmasked faces of the Death Eaters.  In one of the beats of time, Lucius Malfoy had closed his eyes.  Macnair had managed to pass on, blood suspended over his coughing mouth as another instant died.

And then movement was all around me.  Hagrid's knees hit the soft ground with an inaudible squelching sound.  His arm hit a low-lying stone.  The green light was coming nearer now.  My body twisted painfully and against my will, falling toward the shimmer I had been so determined to avoid.  I felt the old break fracture again as I fell, rooted to the spot but victim to gravity.  The light was all in my eyes now, exploding a thousand times over as the pain shot up and down my leg.  My hip hit the earth, my body almost pulled into a right angle.  The light was near my head.  I slid forward, making the movement of my own death faster.  I fell into it, and my face hit the ground with a painful and sickening spatter.  A rush of sound roared through my ears, the first sound since the last sound.  I tried to look up to see what was happening but my neck was suddenly limp and immobile.  I closed my eyes against the mud before splashing into it again.  The rushing sound of a thousand rivers flowed over me, crashing around something behind me and then it was gone.  I felt the clock so many miles away tick.  _Mortal Peril… _It would be most all of us now, but not me.  I wondered how I knew.  How this dared to be the case.  _Not Ron… _The other boys were with Arthur at Headquarters.  _Mortal Peril… _I had removed Ginny's hand... I felt tears, and I breathed again.

And a thousand screams were loosed with the stars

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~*~ A/N- Well, this was by far the most difficult chapter to write so far.  Please let me know if I can improve it, as I certainly cannot claim satisfaction.  Anyhow, in a pleasant turn of events, both Hagrid and Molly survived Macnair's killing curse, each landing uncomfortably and with a broken limb but very much alive.  Argh this one makes me quite grumpy.  The next one, The Loyal Servant, will probably be equally frustrating, but we shall see, we shall see.  My favorite to write so far was Voldie's chap, but I can't wait until what comes after the Loyal Servant… OH the ANTICIPATION which doesn't BELONG HERE!  Thanks for all reviews!! ~*~


	8. The Loyal Servant

**The Loyal Servant**

Nothing moved and I wasn't breathing.

The silence was not the most painful, but it was the most readily sensed.  It came around me like a great wind, prodding all my deepest sores, scratching my eyes.  The silence was so uninformative.  I thought I had felt the boys leg against my flailing arm, thought I had heard a sharp intake of breath.  But then again, that may have been me.  I knew the Longbottom brat didn't know the Persequem Curse, and hadn't heard him say it.  I realized that I had forgotten when sound had halted and sight had died.  I had been too busy with pain.  I had inflicted a good deal of pain over the years.   And I was dying, a hundred times, dying in a moment but I could not hear, I could not breath, I could not see.  I could not live and I could not die, not yet.  

I felt cornered all of a sudden.  The word exploded in my mind's eye, a shard of a diary never to be read again.  _I felt awful today, cornered.  Yes, that's it… cornered… _I hadn't felt cornered for years now, not even in Azkaban.  I had been proud in Azkaban, for as long as possible.  I never reached a point of feeling cornered.  My confidence would hardly wane, even the dementors seeming sickened by such a dark rendition of happiness.  I faded slowly, losing some hope and many dreams, but never my confidence.  Once I was free all I had left was the knowledge of his power over me.  It was at the back of a grimy hill, my body arched, my eyes bleeding, all things around me still that suddenly memories of old diaries drifted back to me.  Old feelings.  My distractions were gone.

I thought.  I thought about my husband and about my home.  I tried to think of things that were neither here nor there, things that would not resurrect my dead past or recall my sinful present.  There were no such things, no things at all.  My thoughts dragged themselves through hellish hours in the dark, through deaths upon deaths, through pain, through loneliness.  And they dragged me with them.  Eventually I reached the moment of our arrival here, the bursting of a hundred bubbles as we all appeared as something of a unit.  And then we had dispersed.  The boy was, as always, to be left for the Dark Lord.  The werewolf was for the filthy traitor.  The Headmistress of the School was for Snape, though I never trusted him.  The Dark Lord claimed to have his reasons and he hid them from me, from us all.  Rodolphus and I were to manage the predicted influx of students from the school howsoever we deemed most entertaining.  The first to come had been Potter, and we had left him.  The next had been Longbottom…

I tried to feel the pain intensify, as it ought to have done with this thought, but I could hardly feel beyond the memories and the darkness.  The silence was oppressive, yes, the surroundings holding me quite immobile, but worst of all things was the blindness.  I tried to see what color it was, tried to sense a solid black or white or red.  I never considered blue, green, or yellow.  They didn't seem appropriate colors for blind.  Every so often I thought I felt a flash of maybe light or maybe dark but it was gone when I was ready to look, and I remembered that there would be no flashing in the stillness of the world.

There had been stories.  Tales of the sixth sense which arose in the absence of all others.  Legends I, myself, had never opted to believe.  My Lord once told me that he had known the Sense in the days of his absence, and I had believed him.  He was, however, quite different from any fool who would claim that as he had blasted off his ears, nose, and tongue and gouged out his eyes he was now blessed with a sense beyond reckoning.  My Lord had described it as Knowing, but the pain stole it from me.  I could not think enough to know my own name for it, the screaming demons racing through me at a speed unmatched in the immobile or mobile worlds.

For they were separate to me now, after such a long time of no time at all.  The world which had been was quite over in my mind, and this dead time was the beginning of something new.  I would have smiled when the thoughts coasted through the chaos of my head, grinned madly because the newness of the world would be the reign of Darkness.  I was so sure of it, indeed, that I could feel myself suddenly desirous of life.  I could never bring myself to regret the deeds that were being avenged, only to regret that the Longbottom idiot had managed such a curse.  It was not one I had often used, for obvious reasons.  

I wanted to live, I wanted to see it all come together, finally.  I wanted to stand by the side of my Lord and my husband and to look down on a land which would be ours.  The faith in anti-Muggle beliefs had been almost completely dissolved, but we had remained loyal.  We had felt the scorn of those who could not understand us.  I had been hurt by such a man, at a mere seventeen, hurt more deeply than any man can know.  I relived those moments a thousand times in Azkaban, those same moments.  And I relived them now...  And my Lord lost his mother to the Muggle scum.  My husband was himself almost killed, violently beaten at sixteen, beaten for having estranged himself.  And some wizards say we owe the Muggles kindness, yet do they not also keep them ignorant?  What is the kindness in modifying memories and letting fate get on with taking salvageable lives?  All wizard kind would be better off for the slaying of Muggles, and of the Muggle-borns who betray those who share their gift, who taint the gift and detract from its credit.  If only I could live to see this end reach, to see the fools who had claimed wisdom grovel and beg mercy, to see them thank us for the service we had done them, to see my own reflection in their glassy eyes.  It was a thirst I had not quenched since those moments when I was seventeen and when I was lost.  _He_ had been my first victim.

An explosion of pain occurred somewhere near my leg.  Then the stillness resumed as though nothing had happened.  It was a few moments before I realized I had seen, seen nothing but seen.  The dark sky was before my, devoid of any star.  The moon I knew to be behind me, where the battles were.  I was trying to remember if I had seen the idiot boy when the next flash of time took my breath away.

I was flat on my back now, my legs curling toward me.  My eyes were frozen open and this time left with sight.  The dark sky was there, and something blacker than the darkness hung just out of sight.

Then I was arched again.  My very last sight was the nothingness of the sky.  Then I heard something like glass shatter deep within me and sight was gone again.  Sounds were starting to creep over me, feeding on me.  They would not be last to do so.  I exhaled.

And a thousand screams were loosed with the stars

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~*~ A/N -  Now, Bella actually died.  As a follow-up to the last AN, I did sort of enjoy this chapter, especially offering even the feeble credit which I could to the cause of Darkness.  PLEASE don't go all 'make love not war' on me because I'm not mean like Bella here.  Persequem Curse is just revenge.  The crime committed against her at seventeen is rape.  The dark thing in the corner of her eye is… OH, wait… never mind.  Hehe.  Next up is the long-awaited, at least by me… The Potions Master.  I must confess I am excited.  I should get writing.  Thank you for reviews.  That means you, Daintress.  You are very thoughtful!  COUNTDOWN TO The Potions Master………….. ~*~


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